Miami Heat

The Miami Heat is an American professional basketball team based in Miami, Florida. The Heat compete in the National Basketball Association (NBA) as a member of the league's Eastern Conference Southeast Division. They play their home games at the American Airlines Arena in Downtown Miami. The team owner is Micky Arison, who also owns cruise-ship giant Carnival Corporation. The team president and de facto general manager is Pat Riley, and the head coach is Erik Spoelstra. The mascot of the team is Burnie, an anthropomorphic fireball.

Formed in 1988 as an expansion franchise, the Heat have won three league championships (in 2006, 2012 and 2013), five conference titles and 11 division titles. From February 3 to March 27, 2013, the Heat won 27 games in a row, the second-longest streak in NBA history (after the 1971–72 Los Angeles Lakers' 33 wins). In 2016, Forbes valued the Heat at $1.3 billion as the tenth most valuable among NBA franchises.

The Heat are not related to the Miami Floridians, an ABA team in the early 1970s, although the Heat have occasionally paid tribute to the older franchise by wearing a replica version of the Floridians' uniforms for the NBA's "Hardwood Classics Nights" during the 2005–06 and 2011–12 seasons.

Miami

Miami (/maɪˈæmi/; Spanish pronunciation: [maiˈami]) is a city located on the Atlantic coast in southeastern Florida and the county seat of Miami-Dade County. The 44th-most populated city proper in the United States, with a population of 417,650, it is the principal, central, and most populous city of the Miami metropolitan area, and the most populous metropolis in the Southeastern United States after Washington, D.C. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Miami's metro area is the eighth-most populous and fourth-largest urban area in the United States, with a population of around 5.5 million.

Miami is a major center, and a leader in finance, commerce, culture, media, entertainment, the arts, and international trade. In 2012, Miami was classified as an Alpha−World City in the World Cities Study Group's inventory. In 2010, Miami ranked seventh in the United States in terms of finance, commerce, culture, entertainment, fashion, education, and other sectors. It ranked 33rd among global cities. In 2008, Forbes magazine ranked Miami "America's Cleanest City", for its year-round good air quality, vast green spaces, clean drinking water, clean streets, and city-wide recycling programs. According to a 2009 UBS study of 73 world cities, Miami was ranked as the richest city in the United States, and the world's fifth-richest city in terms of purchasing power. Miami is nicknamed the "Capital of Latin America", is the second largest U.S. city with a Spanish-speaking majority, and the largest city with a Cuban-American plurality.